2nd Call for Proposals of “EUI – Innovative Actions” targets Greening Cities, Sustainable Tourism, and Harnessing Talent in shrinking cities

Deadline: 5-Oct-23

The European Urban Initiative is seeking proposals to fund projects to deliver tangible, real-life examples under the topics ‘Greening Cities’, ‘Sustainable tourism’ and ‘Harnessing talent in shrinking cities’.

With an indicative budget of EUR 120 million ERDF, the second Call for Proposals of EUI – Innovative Actions is targeting innovative projects focusing on the three topics.

Topics of the Call

 

• Topic 1: Greening cities: Under the topic ‘Greening Cities’ projects will be funded to experiment and deliver tangible innovative solutions on green infrastructure across European cities, for better addressing the biodiversity, pollution, resource and climate challenges, including synergy development with other key policy areas. The innovative solutions tested under the funded projects are expected to contribute to Cohesion policy investments related to the green and just transition, and will embrace the issue of being affordable to all.
• Topic 2: Sustainable tourism: Under the topic ‘Sustainable tourism’, projects will be funded to support the long-term green and digital transformation and resilience of the tourism ecosystem. By introducing unique solutions and comprehensive policies for the promotion and management of sustainable tourism, cities can set an example for smaller towns, villages and regions that are more dependent on tourism for their economy, particularly in terms of reducing overdependence on a single sector and combining tourism economic activities with other investments and job creation efforts for diversification to other sectors.
• Topic 3: Harnessing talent in shrinking cities: Under the topic ‘Harnessing talent in shrinking cities’, particularly in the mentioned regions identified by the European Commission in the Communication ‘Harnessing talent in Europe’s regions’, will be supported to test new solutions to retain and attract talent. The call is seeking to identify placed-based and integrated pilot projects, i.e. involving local communities in experimentations at the urban scale and addressing the economic, social and environmental dimensions of the faced demographic challenges, in a way that could inspire the use of Cohesion policy programmes in these urban areas.

European Urban Initiative – Two Strands

• The EUI includes two strands:
  • support of innovative actions, and
  • support of capacity and knowledge building, territorial impact assessments, policy development and communication. Main elements of the EUI intervention logic.
• The specific objectives of the strand (a) support of innovative actions are:
  • To identify and support the testing of transferable and scalable innovative solutions to address issues relating to sustainable urban development at Union level;
  • To collect and share results from experimentations and support transfer activities, in view of fostering innovation capacities and knowledge building for all EU urban areas and mainstreaming innovative solutions in sustainable urban development, under Article 11 of the ERDF/CF Regulation and beyond.
• The specific objectives of the strand (b) support of capacity and knowledge building, territorial impact assessments, policy development and communication are:
  • Capacity building part (sub-strand b.1)
    • To improve the capacities of cities in the design of sustainable urban development policies, strategies and practices in an integrated and participative way;
    • To improve the design and implementation of sustainable urban development policies, strategies and action plans in cities.
  • Knowledge building, territorial impact assessments, policy development and communication part (substrand b.2)
    • To develop a knowledge base in support of better sustainable urban development policy and strategy design, implementation and mainstreaming;
    • To ensure easier access to horizontal and thematic knowledge and share knowhow on sustainable urban development;
    • To support the Urban Agenda for the EU, and upon request of Member State(s), to possibly support the intergovernmental cooperation on urban matters.

Thematic Coverage

• As recalled, the European Urban Initiative is established as one of the tools supporting the implementation of the Urban Agenda for the EU – a key vehicle for the implementation of the New Leipzig Charter.
• In order to achieve meaningful and measurable results at local level, one of the central aims of the Urban Agenda for the EU is to better target the funds, initiatives and efforts of the European Commission towards those urban challenges that local authorities and inhabitants feel are most pressing. EUI-IA, as previously Urban Innovative Actions Initiative, will continue to contributing to this operational aim of the Urban Agenda for the EU.
• In continuity with the Urban Innovative Actions approach, EUI-IA Calls for Proposals will be organised on topics defined by the Commission building on the New Leipzig Charter and on Commission’s priorities presenting a cross-sectorial dimension, such as the green and digital transitions.
• The early announcement of these topics and their coherence with Charter’s thematic pointers (green, just, productive cities) and principles of good urban governance that are of direct relevance for Cohesion policy objective for ‘a Europe closer to citizens’ (place-based, integrated, participatory approaches) will enhance the predictability for applicants around core objectives to be achieved Call after Call by the EUI-IA.
• In order to raise the readability of EUI-IA projects with regard to Cohesion policy and facilitate their subsequent upscale and/or replication with ERDF funding, Calls for Proposals will also specify the Cohesion policy objective(s) or specific objective(s), as appropriate, targeted by each topic within each Call.
• Each EUI-IA Call for Proposals will focus on certain topic(s) which will be defined by the European Commission.

Funding Information

• Each project can receive up to a maximum of EUR 5 million ERDF co-financing and project implementation should take place within a maximum period of 3,5 years.
• This overall lump sum of EUR 100 000 total eligible costs (corresponding to EUR 80 000 ERDF) consists of the lump sum of EUR 25 000 (corresponding to EUR 20 000 ERDF) for project preparation and the lump sum of EUR 75 000 (corresponding to EUR 60 000 ERDF) for the Initiation Phase.

EUI-IA supports projects that are:

• Innovative: Projects should be new, bold, creative and experimental. The proposed project must go beyond the present state-of-the-art and business-as-usual. Building on research and benchmarking, urban authorities should demonstrate that the proposed project has not been previously tested and implemented on the ground in the urban area, in the Member State where the urban area is located or elsewhere in the EU.
• Of good quality: Projects should meet key quality standards such as clear and logical interrelation of objectives/activities/outputs, evidence of preparatory work, realistic ambitions, effective management structures and procedures, good value for money.
• Participative: Urban authorities should seek to benefit from sources of external expertise from their local innovation ecosystems such as academia, industry, civil society and other levels of government both in the design and in the implementation of the project. To ensure the participative approach they need to define effective mechanisms of consultation, coordination and co-design.
• Measurable: Urban authorities should be able to clearly explain what the changes are that they want to achieve in the local context as a result of their projects.
• Sustainable and scalable: Urban authorities should be able to anticipate and explain how the solution will be sustained and scaled-up once successfully tested through the identification of adequate sources of public and/or private funding, including from Cohesion policy and/or project partners own resources and/or embedded mechanisms of financial self-sustainability (e.g. revolving funds, crowdfunding, revenues).
• Transferable: Solutions developed in the framework of the projects should be applicable and replicable by other cities across Europe, possibly by making use of the Cohesion policy funding available to them. Based on their experience, urban authorities should be able to explain the conditions (legislative, technical, etc.), resources needed (human, financial, etc.) and potential challenges to overcome, that other urban authorities should consider in order to adapt and possibly replicate, in full or in part, the proposed solutions in their local contexts.

Eligible Authorities

• The following authorities may apply for support to undertake the EUI-IA:
  • First category: Any urban authority of a local administrative unit defined according to the degree of urbanisation (DEGURBA) of Eurostat as city, town or suburb (corresponding to DEGURBA code 1 or DEGURBA code 2 of Eurostat) comprising at least 50 000 inhabitants.
  • Second category: An association or grouping of urban authorities with legal status of organised agglomeration composed by Local Administrative Units, where the majority (at least 51%) of inhabitants lives in Local Administrative Units defined according to the degree of urbanisation (DEGURBA) of Eurostat as cities, towns or suburbs (corresponding to DEGURBA code 1 or DEGURBA code 2) and where the total combined population is at least 50 000 inhabitants.
  • Third category: An association or grouping of urban authorities without legal status of organised agglomerations where all the urban authorities involved (Main Urban Authority – hereinafter: MUA, and Associated Urban Authorities – hereinafter: AUA) are Local Administrative Units defined according to the degree of urbanisation (DEGURBA) of Eurostat as cities, towns or suburbs (corresponding to DEGURBA code 1 or DEGURBA code 2) and where the total combined population (MUA and AUA) is at least 50 000 inhabitants.

Common Requirements for Eligible Urban Authorities

• In addition to the principles outlined for each specific category of eligible urban authorities, the following principles apply to all eligible urban authorities in the framework of the EUI-IA:
  • All urban authorities shall be located in an EU Member State.
  • Only eligible urban authorities as defined may submit an Application Form in the framework of the EUI-IA Call for Proposals. An Application Form submitted by a Delivery Partner will be declared ineligible.
  • Urban authorities can be listed in a project proposal only as MUA and/or AUA. The category of Delivery Partners is reserved only to institutions and/or organisations that are not recognised as urban authorities in the framework of the EUI-IA.
  • If innovative solutions require an urban-rural interface or functional area approach, it is possible to include Local Administrative Units defined as rural according to their degree of urbanization (DEGURBA code 3 of Eurostat) as Delivery Partners. Please note that their number of inhabitants does not count to reach the minimum eligibility threshold of 50 000. The reason for including Local Administrative Units defined as rural must be clearly presented and justified in the Application Form.
  • An urban authority or an organised agglomeration can be involved in only one project proposal in the framework of each Call for Proposals (even if these project proposals are submitted under different topics in the same Call for Proposals). The rule applies also to the AUA (a municipality can be involved in only one project proposal whether it is as a MUA or as an AUA).
  • Urban authorities already supported in an approved project by the EUI-IA in the framework of a previous Call for Proposals cannot submit a new Application Form on the same topic over the entire duration of the Initiative.
  • Urban authorities must comply with the requirements on exclusion from access to funding
• Agencies and companies (e.g.: in the field of energy/waste management, economic development, touristic promotion, etc.) fully or partially owned by the municipality/city council are not considered as Local Administrative Units and therefore cannot be recognised as eligible urban authorities.

For more information, visit EUI.